Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1887-05-05
GDIAMoND STORY.
The Clever Work Now Accomplished by
DIshonest LapIdarIes.

A well known diamond dealer. who
has become an expert from many years
handling of precious stones. was near
" taken in few DAYS ago by a shrewd
diamond shark. whose new scheme de-
serves attention. rs it is likely to be at
tempted in some other quarter. The
dodge consists in trying to palm of
cleyerly ''doctored" diamond as a very
valuable stone and IN telling a plausible
and picturesque story to give 1t coun-
tenance.
The short, stout man. with grizzled,
gray mustache, who tried to yictimize
the ieweler in question, brought to him
an elegant-looking solitaire ring, pur-
porting to contain diamond of unusual
size and brilliancy. To the eye even
of the expert the stone looked all right.
and the man tried hard 10 make bar
gain with him at once, without pro-
ceeding any further. As it looked, the
diamond was easily worth E200, and
the man, who told tale of dire neces-
sity. offered to sell it for E100.
The story of the diamond as told by
the man, who gave the name of Charles
Harwood, was that it belonged origin
ally to the Grand Duke Alexis of Russia.
In December 1871, when the Grand
Duke, who was young and handsome,
attended the reception given in his
honor in the Academy of Music. an
episode accurred that attracted consid-
cradle attention at the time and has
been much talked of since.
Some time after the promenade, and
when everything was in motion. the at
tcntion of the Duke, who had gone up
stairs with two of the gentleman of the
committee, was attracted by lady in
one of the corner rows of curtained
balcony boxes. There were but two
ladies in the box. one of them an elder
ly lady and the other tall, beautiful
young woman, about 20 years of age.
who had remarkably fine eyes, which
could not fail to be noticed.
The Grand Duke expressed desire to
be introduced, which was soon gratitied,
and after standing for few moments
in front of the box he asked permission
to go inside. In a little while he asked
the lady to 90 on the promenade, and
otherwise showed his pleasure at meet
ing her, but she mildly and persistently
refused.
AS he rose to go, the Duke, holding
her hand moment and slipping from
one of his fingers diamond ring. pre-
sented it to her and asked her to keep
it us a souvenir of the occasion. The
lady did so. and kept it for several
| q In 81 ohnf fan ,nkA
circumstances and determined to get
rid of the ring in spite of its associa-
tions
Such, in substance, are the facts of an
occurrence upon which the man with
the diamond to sell told his story. He
represented that the diamond he had
was the one given to this lady. and he
endeavorcd very clearly to trace its his
tory to her. The jeweler, however, in.
sisted upon removing the stone from the
setting to examine it. and this the man
allowed him to do.
The mans willingness to do this very
nearly threw the jeweler off his guard
at the last moment especially as upon
removing the stone he could see nothing
wrong with it. Taking up microscope,
however. he was able to detect, with q
close scrutiny, slight variation in the
quality and texture Of the stone between
the middle portions and the ends.
( Then he held the stone near q lamp,
and in few minutes the whole natur c
of the Ingenious fraud dawned upon
| him. A small real diamond of inferior
| quality formed the top and bottom, and
u fine piece of crystal had been sand
wiched between them, adding nearly
ten times to the value of the stone. II
had been SO cleverly and ingeniously
put together with u colorless cement
that it was almost beyond the power Of
detection. The man. of course, express
ed surprise, and asserted that the dia.
mond was just us he received it. It'd
Bits.